Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning 258: Intermediate Quantitative Reasoning   Tags: course, uep  

Searching Strategies

Keyword Searching and Additional Search Tips

Suggested Keywords and Strategies

Using Google and Google Scholar

Selected Databases

Best Article Databases for Urban Studies & Planning

Best Article Databases for Environment & Planning

Interdisciplinary Article Databases

Data and Statistics

Federal

State and Local

International

Data Resources Provided by the Tufts Libraries

Centers, Organizations and Associations

Citing and Managing Sources

Urban and Environmental Policy & Planning

Combine your subject/topic with one or more of the following:

• data
• statistics
• analysis
• metadata
• variance
• distribution
• probability
• correlation
• variable
• algorithm
• model/s
• table(s)
• figure(s)

Examples: 

housing and "land use" and (data or statistics)

green and (construction or building) and (data or statistics)

You can also combine your subject/topic with the name of a specific technique, statistical term, test, etc.

Example: "analysis of variance" and housing and construction

Use Advance Search modes in databases to limit search results to those that include data, statistics, tables or figures.

Keyword Search Rules for the Library Catalog and Databases

Using AND/OR/NOT (Boolean Search Operators)
AND	Use AND to focus search and combine different aspects of your topic. Example: housing and sustainable development
OR	Use OR to expand your search and find synonyms/related terms. Example: eco-justice or environmental justice
NOT	Use NOT to exclude a word or phrase from your search Example: housing not rural

See the Basic Search Tips guides for more information, including examples.  Or use the Keyword Searching Worksheet to get started.

Use more words

When you search the web, a one or two word search often will find hundreds of thousands of websites. To narrow your search and find more relevant web sites, think about your topic and how people might be writing about it. Then use at least three or four keywords or concepts in your search.

Search for phrases

If you can describe your topic with words that could also be used as a phrase, narrow your search by enclosing your phrase in quotations:

"urban sustainable development"

"global warming"

Limit your search

Most search engines have advanced or expert features that allow you to limit your search. Search limits can vary depending on the features of the search engine you are using. A few common ways of limiting include:

• Type of web site  or domain name (.edu, .com, .org., .gov): If you are finding too many web pages from commercial sources, you can limit to pages that come from an educational institution by typing .edu as a search limit.
• Date: You can search for pages updated within a certain range of time.
• Location: Many search engines allow you to find web pages published in a particular country.
• File type: Reduce search results by limiting to .doc, .pdf, .ppt, etc.

Google Scholar

Use the Advanced Scholar Search when searching in Google Scholar. Journal article searches can be more focused by limiting by by author, publication title, date or subject areas.

From the Google Scholar homepage, choose Scholar Preferences to link to Tufts University libraries resources.